Bush’s xenophobic pandering knows no legal limits
Feds: Administration will use waivers of regulations to build more of border fence
WASHINGTON – The Bush administration will use its authority to bypass more than 30 laws and regulations in an effort to finish building 670 miles of fence along the southwest U.S. border by the end of this year, federal officials said Tuesday.
Invoking the two legal waivers – which Congress authorized – will cut through bureaucratic red tape and sidestep environmental laws that currently stand in the way of the Homeland Security Department building 267 miles of fencing in California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas, according to officials familiar with the plan.
“Criminal activity at the border does not stop for endless debate or protracted litigation,” Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said in a statement. “These waivers will enable important security projects to keep moving forward.”
Residents and property owners along the U.S.-Mexico border have complained about the construction of fencing. In South Texas, where opposition has been widespread, land owners refused to give the government access to property along the fence route. The government has since sued more than 50 property owners in South Texas to gain access to the land.
Environmentalists have also complained about the fence because they say it puts already endangered species such as two types of wild cats – the ocelot and the jaguarundi – in even more danger of extinction. They say the fence would prevent them from swimming across the Rio Grande to mate. </em>
Bush couldn’t care less about border security- as long as his buddies in “da bidness” keep their pockets stuffed, he’ll let anyone into the country who can scale a fence, swim a river or dig a tunnel. But building a fence throws a sop to the rabid Lou Dobbs crowd, who feel that America is drowning under the burden of illegals. Yeah, whatever. Our economy would grind to a halt if we didn’t have our version of slave labor, and everyone involved knows it. But it’s a fun little rhetorical game to play, this puffed up indignation that some sweaty Mexican is taking your tax money or clogging up your emergency rooms- which of course isn’t exactly true– so we won’t let reality intrude on the Minutemen- not that they’d believe it anyway, since they didn’t hear it on Fox.
Jackass.
